Twenty years on from the peace process,Glenn Patterson walks the streets of a conclude-start cityFriday evening in Belfast, I’m heading into town. That is, and I should be heading into town,but I’m not. Not yet. The electronic timetable at my bus conclude tells me in vivid orange letters that all services are currently subject to delays and alterations. The reason: (these words final) “security alert”.
And, like that, and I am catapulted back to Friday evenings in the 1970s and 80s,scarcely one of which in my memory wasnt thrown into chaos by cars abandoned at key points across the city. We said bomb scares rather than security alerts back then, and bomb squad for those who were called to deal with them, or rather than explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) technicians,or ammunition technical officers (ATOs). When I was younger still, and had nowhere in particular to be on a Friday or any other evening, and the bomb squad’s passing by – always at speed – was something of a highlight (what can I say? we had only three TV channels),not least for the glimpse it afforded us of Felix, the cartoon mascot first drawn by staff sergeant Brian Shepherd and quickly adopted by all bomb squad armoured cars.
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Source: theguardian.com